Daily Intelligence: Forced to Save the Beautiful President at the Beginning

175: Chapter 176 I Cured His Hidden IllnessZhou Yurou took the water, sat down, and immediately frowned, her fingertips unconsciously tapping the report in her hand: ”Master Li Yong? What happened to him? Does Tianming want to target the medical ai clinical trials too?”

”It’s trickier than that.” Zhang Fan leaned against the edge of the table, his voice dropping a few degrees. ”The system just issued a warning. Li Yong has an ancestral herbal formula for cancer—it’s been clinically verified to have a particularly significant inhibitory effect on late-stage liver cancer. Tianming sent Wang Haoyu of Tianhua Pharmaceutical to seize it; they either want to swindle the formula out of him or report him to the police for ’practicing medicine without a license’ to get him arrested.”

”An anti-cancer formula?” Zhou Yurou’s hand holding the water cup paused, her eyes full of confusion. Her fingertips unconsciously traced the words ”Alternative Supply Chain Manufacturers” on the report. ”Does this formula... have a direct connection to our opposition against Tianming? Isn’t our current priority to stabilize the capital chain and secure the production of the Star Core Engine?”

”It has a huge connection.” Zhang Fan leaned over and pointed to the medical ai clinical progress chart on the corner of the table, which still had the bone injury diagnosis optimization suggestions marked by Li Yong attached to it. ”The medical ai is currently relying on Li Yong’s clinical experience to tune the model. If he gets arrested, the model training will have to stop, and our cooperation with hospitals will have to be shelved. Even worse, if that formula falls into Tianming’s hands, they’ll have another trump card in the pharmaceutical field—we haven’t even survived the financial stranglehold yet, and if we let them monopolize anti-cancer drug technology, we’ll be attacked from both sides, making it hard to recover.”

These words were like a thunderclap, instantly waking Zhou Yurou up. She gripped the report tightly, her knuckles turning white, the fatigue from just moments ago completely swept away. ”I understand. This is Tianming splitting our focus! They’re using finance to drag us down while secretly seizing technology. Once we’re overwhelmed and unable to attend to everything, they’ll swoop in to reap the benefits!”

”That’s exactly right.” Zhang Fan nodded, picked up his phone, and gave it a shake. ”Old Gu has already gone to look for him at Li Yong’s home, but the phone won’t go through. I’m going to check the free clinic spot in the west of the city that he often visits—it’s all old neighbors there; I might be able to get some news.”

Zhou Yurou stood up immediately and placed the report on the table, her movements crisp and decisive: ”Go find him, stay safe, and keep me updated whenever you have news.”

Pushing open the office door, the employees outside were still busy at their computers, the sound of keyboard clicking rising and falling—some were checking supply chain lists, others were tracking the flow of funds in Hong Kong stocks. No one knew that this war centered around finance had already quietly pulled out another, more lethal thread.

The asphalt road on the outskirts of the city became narrower and narrower, eventually turning into a potholed concrete road. Zhang Fan parked the car under an old locust tree and looked up to see the house at the end of the alley with a wooden sign hanging that read ”Li’s Clinic”—the wall plaster was mottled, the windows were covered with old newspapers, and two chipped wooden stools were placed at the entrance. It was out of place with the surrounding new-style houses, yet it exuded an old-fashioned, lived-in atmosphere.

Gu Jingshen was leaning against the door frame smoking, with two men in black jackets standing beside him; they were friends he had brought to help. Seeing Zhang Fan’s car, he immediately stubbed out his cigarette and walked up to meet him: ”Fan Zi, you’re finally here! We’ve only been here for ten minutes. Divine Doctor Li is inside organizing herbs, his expression isn’t very good, and he won’t say much when asked anything.”

”He must have sensed something was wrong.” Zhang Fan pushed open the car door and grabbed the jacket from the back seat. ”Wang Haoyu’s people might already be watching this place. Let’s go inside to talk; don’t be conspicuous at the door.”

As soon as they entered the clinic, they smelled a rich fragrance of herbs. Li Yong was squatting behind the counter, holding a small scale to weigh herbs. His graying hair was combed neatly, and the blue cloth gown he wore was washed until it was faded, yet it was clean. Hearing footsteps, he looked up, paused for a moment when he saw Zhang Fan, and the scale beam in his hand froze in mid-air: ”Young President Zhang? Why are you here? Is there a problem with the medical ai?”

There was a hint of confusion in his eyes, as well as a trace of imperceptible vigilance—in the past few days, Wang Haoyu’s people had frequently come to ”visit,” bringing money and making threats. He was feeling flustered, so when a ”partner” suddenly showed up, it was inevitable that he would be suspicious.

Zhang Fan walked to the front of the counter and sat down without beating around the bush: ”Uncle Li, I’m not here to talk about the ai. I’m here to help you. Has Wang Haoyu from Tianhua Group been looking for you lately? And saying he wants to do you harm?”

”How did you know?” Li Yong’s body stiffened abruptly, and the herbs in his hand scattered all over the floor with a ”clatter.” He hurriedly squatted down to pick them up, but his fingertips kept trembling. When he looked up, the vigilance in his eyes was even heavier: ”Young President Zhang, what is your relationship with the Wang family? Did they send you to pry information out of me?”

”Uncle Li, please don’t misunderstand.” Zhang Fan quickly waved his hand, his tone sincere. ”I have no relationship with Wang Haoyu; on the contrary, I am a sworn enemy of the people behind him. You’ve been in contact with me for so long, you should know what kind of person I am—if I wanted to harm you, there would be no need for me to go through the trouble of collaborating with you on the medical ai, and even less need to travel this far to warn you.”

He paused, bringing up a previous matter: ”Last time you were consulting for an orthopedic patient at the hospital, I was watching from the side. To help the patient save money on medicine, you paid for the herbal costs out of your own pocket. And for the medical ai model, you were afraid the data wouldn’t be accurate, so you stayed up all night to organize thirty years of case files for us—as a healer like you, I couldn’t possibly watch you be bullied.”

Gu Jingshen also chimed in from the side: ”Divine Doctor Li, what Fan Zi said is true! That brat Wang Haoyu is a scumbag, we’ve long been displeased with him! Whatever is going on, just tell us, we’ll help you figure it out!”

Li Yong looked at Zhang Fan’s sincere eyes, then glanced at the indignant Gu Jingshen beside him, and the guard in his heart gradually relaxed. He sighed, straightened up, walked into the back room, and closed the door before lowering his voice, his tone full of anger and helplessness: ”You were right, Wang Haoyu truly has ill intentions—because I cured his illness, and yet he has turned around and wants my life!”

”He wants revenge after you cured his illness?” Gu Jingshen’s eyes widened. ”Is that kid sick in the head?”

”He is sick, and it’s an unspeakable ailment.” Li Yong’s fingers gripped until they turned white, his voice filled with gnashing hatred. ”Last winter, he found me through a friend and said he had a ’hidden ailment,’ that his marital life wasn’t working. He had been to many big hospitals but couldn’t get cured, and people were gossiping about him. He begged me to save him, saying that as long as I could cure him, he would pay any amount of money.”

Li Yong paused, recalling the scene at the time: ”I saw that he was pitiful, and thinking of the benevolent heart of a healer, I used my ancestral herbal formula to treat him—brewing medicine every day, acupuncture; after struggling for more than three months, I finally cured him. He was moved to tears at the time, said he wanted to adopt me as his godfather, and even presented a plaque that read ’Miraculous Hands Rejuvenate.’ I actually thought he was a person who knew how to be grateful.”

But I didn’t expect that as soon as he was cured, Wang Haoyu would completely change.